


a pebble to skip and make a wish

by siojo



Category: One Piece
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bird Courting Habits, Getting Together, M/M, Penguin Mating Habits, stones
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-18
Updated: 2019-12-18
Packaged: 2021-02-16 12:57:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21508312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/siojo/pseuds/siojo
Summary: Ace's bedroom door has a line of stones when he returns to it, at least once a day, even if he doesn't know why.
Relationships: Fushichou Marco | Phoenix Marco/Portgas D. Ace
Comments: 15
Kudos: 311
Collections: Marco and Ace Fics





	a pebble to skip and make a wish

**Author's Note:**

> Hello, this is my first time doing a prompt and it feels like ordering at a drive-thru. Could you please write something with Marco trying to court Ace like a bird? I really like your work and enjoy anything you write. I hope you have a good day.

Ace tips his head to the side, studying the array of stones left at the door to his room, each one carefully polished and set to compliment both it and the ones next to it. Each one is sparkling and attention catching, some of them nothing more than Fool’s Gold and others sparkling Rubies with veins of something else creeping over the surface.

“Those look like a lot of money this time,” Deuce states, arching a brow at the stones and stepping over them into Ace’s room without a thought. “You got an admirer here?”

“Are stones something that you give to someone to tell them that you like them?” Ace asks curiously, picking up the stones carefully, tracing a thumb over the sharp edge of the ruby before setting it aside for the soft blue stone with golden webbing.

“Normally only when you want to marry them.”

Ace frowns, setting his new stones carefully onto his desk besides the others, “You give stones to someone to get married?”

“Sometimes I forget you grew up as a feral forest child and then you say something like that and it comes rushing back to me,” Deuce states shaking his head. “You make a ring and have a stone, something fancy or expensive, and use it to ask someone to marry you.”

“Why?”

“If I knew why people did things, I would be a historian instead of a pirate and a doctor.”

“They’re nice,” Ace says softly, running his thumb over the blue stone again. “Do you know what this one is?”

“Turquoise. My,” Deuce pauses, looking uncomfortable for a moment. “Ma used to have some, she liked the color. The shiny shit is gold. But I think you know that. Since you’re a pirate.”

“It’s pretty,” Ace says frowning at his friend as he trades it for the blue stone in his pocket. “This one?”

“Aquamarine, give me a challenge here, Ace.”

“Why am I getting them?”

Deuce barks out a laugh, collapsing onto Ace’s bed and pushing his mask up off his face to press the heels of his palms against his eyes, “If I knew that, I would be teasing you more. You’re the weirdo getting stones.”

“They’re nice,” Ace says defensively. “I, they’re a _gift_.”

He knows that Deuce has caught the inflection on the word when he sighs and rolls onto his side, silent for a long minute. The silence is loud enough that Ace’s ears are starting to ringing.

“You like gifts, don’t you?”

“I haven’t gotten many.”

Deuce sighs, forcing himself upright, “Alright, I’ll ask around. See if I can find out anything about stones and shit for you. Since I can be subtle, unlike you.”

“I’m subtle!”

“No you aren’t,” Deuce says grinning, even when Ace launches three of his Hotarubi across the space between them. “Ace, you know that it could mean anything.”

Ace nods and his chest aches, the Blues are vast and the customs even more so. The stones could be a gift or a curse or a warning. They might mean nothing or mean someone knows who his father is and plan to kill him, even if it sounds crazy. Ace doesn’t know what to think, but he hopes they’re gifts.

“You’re,” Deuce pauses, watching Ace for a moment, something unreadable in his expression. “We would still do anything for you, if you need us. Even if it means turning our backs on the Whitebeard Pirates. You still have us, no matter what.”

Ace watches the door close behind him and lets his shoulders fall, the lump in his throat heavy and painful as he tries to breathe through it.

* * *

“Here,” Deuce states three days later, looking more uncomfortable than the time he had been propositioned by a marine on Waters Seven. “It took a lot of work to find this out for you, so you best read this whole fucking thing.”

“This is a book on flightless sea birds,” Ace says slowly, recognizing the species on the cover. Gramps had said that they didn’t have enough meat on them to be satisfying and were too fast to be worth it. “Why do you even have this?”

“Because it will answer your stone questions,” Deuce says forcefully, refusing to meet Ace’s eye. “You have no idea what I did to get your answers and I feel like I’ve sold my soul, so you are going to read that cover to cover, with special focus on the stone thing.”

Ace frowns after him, even when the door to his room slams closed, before shrugging it off and opening it. It’s only the work of a few minutes to skim the book for what he wants, leaving him frowning at the mention of courtship and gifts, because he doesn’t know what that means. Courtship sounds like something nobles do or the romance novels that Makino didn’t keep in her house. But there’s no definition for it.

“You know,” Ace tells Kotatsu, frowning as he reads over the information again. “I think I’m more confused than I was before Deuce got me information.”

Kotatsu murrs, stretching over the bed to try and claim the whole thing for himself. Ace reaches over to scratch under his chin, trying to remember if there was a dictionary in the library that Thatch had shown him after he had joined the crew. He can’t remember and he’s not sure the definition won’t include words that he doesn’t know too. Just like the time that he had finally looked up some of the words that Sabo had used.

Ace takes a quick breath, clearing his mind before he can remember more, picking up the book and leaving his door open enough to let Kotatsu come and go as he pleased. Marco’s door is open, thankfully, so Ace doesn’t bother stopping to knock.

“Is something wrong,” Marco asks, looking at Ace over the tops of his glasses. There’s something in his eyes that makes Ace’s stomach feel too warm and cold in equal measures. “You look upset.”

“I found a word that I don’t know. Several words,” Ace admits, because Marco doesn’t treat Ace differently when he doesn’t know things. “Could you help me understand them?”

“I might need context for them.”

Ace nods, holding up his book, “They said that the birds used stones for courtship and mating. What does that mean?”

“For birds it means trying to attract a mate, to get another of their species interested in them.”

“Mating?”

“Sex or having children. Mate is similar to husband or wife.”

Ace frowns thoughtfully, “So they use stones to make other birds be attracted to them.”

“Birds all have rituals to convince, usually, females of their species to mate with them. Some dance or have bright colors, others give gifts.”

“Like stones.”

“Like stones.”

“This doesn’t really explain anything,” Ace mutters to himself. “Why would birds giving stones to other birds relate to someone giving them to me?”

Marco’s cheeks look red, like he’s gonna blush, “Perhaps they’re using the same method.”

“Oh,” Ace wrinkles his nose. “How do I respond? The penguins build nests with them, but I don’t think I can do that. And if I don’t know who to talk to about it, doesn’t that mean that I can’t answer?”

“I’m sure you’ll figure something out. I have a meeting with Pops, so I have to go, but if you need more help in a little while, I could come around?”

“No thanks. Thank you for the answers, Marco!”

* * *

“Marco is a bird sometimes,” Ace says two days later, watching Deuce to see what his reaction will be. He decides he’s right when Deuce spills the bottle of ink he was using. “So the stones are from him.”

“How are you this smart yet so stupid at the same time,” Deuce hisses over his ruined report. “This was about Pops’ health, couldn’t you have waited ten minutes?”

“No,” Ace answers, because he couldn’t have. The question has been there for days now, waiting for him to connect something and now he has his answer. “Marco is courting me. Like a penguin.”

Deuce sighs, leaving the report to ruin on his desk to face Ace, “Phoenix is weird. All zoan has habits and carry over from their animistic side but there’s never been much stated about the Phoenix Zoan, it’s mythical,” he pauses, looking for his words. “Izou mentioned it to me when I started probing for you. He had a funny story about Marco tripping over his own feet while dancing.”

“Marco likes me.”

“You like him.”

Ace doesn’t deny it, it wouldn’t work even if he tried. He does like Marco. Marco is nice and makes sure that Ace is comfortable with what happens around him. He isn’t opposed to the courtship, he thinks at least not when it’s Marco. He wouldn’t consider it if Deuce was giving him stones.

“What are you planning on doing?” Deuce asks when Ace says nothing.

“Penguins build nests with their stones,” Ace answers, standing up and rolling his shoulders as he stretches. “I’m not a penguin, but I think I can build something with them.”

“I don’t think you have to respond like a penguin would.”

“Marco started this.”

Ace doesn’t say that it feels wrong to respond to Marco’s attempts with just words, not when there’s a procedure to the courtship that Marco’s started. But he thinks that Deuce understands him anyway, if the look he’s given means anything.

“Should I wish you luck?”

“No, I don’t think I need it.”

Deuce laughs, loud enough to follow Ace out of the room that they had claimed for their work. It echoes in his ears as he opens the door to his room and carefully pulls out his stones, setting them onto the ground. Hopefully this wouldn’t fall apart on him.

* * *

Marco stares at the circle of stones, only three stacks high and just barely big enough for Ace to lay in it, his knees pulled up to his chest as he sleeps. His mouth feels dry and the weight of the newest set of stones in his pocket feel like lead in his pockets, but the sight of what can only loosely be called a nest makes his heart feel like it will beat out of his chest. 

It seems like hours before he moves into Ace’s room, pushing the door to, like it had been before he had knocked, kneeling down and setting the newest stones in a little line before the wall.

“Not gonna add ‘em?” Ace mutters sleepily, smiling when Marco looks up at him.

“That would be presumptuous of me.”

Ace snorts, yawning as he pushes himself upright, “Thought making them into a nest was an answer.”

“For a bird.”

“You started this like a bird,” he pauses, humming softly at something that Marco can’t see. “I like you.”

Marco swallows, “I like you too.”

“You could have just asked, ya know. Would have been easier.”

“I know.”

Ace nods, like he knows what Marco isn’t saying, “People don’t do courtship, what are we doing?”

“Dating, getting to know each other to know to see if we like each other enough to fall in love.”

“Dating,” Ace pulls a face, like the word is strange to him and perhaps it is. “Does this mean I can kiss you? I’ve been thinking about it, I would like to kiss you.”

“If you like.”

He doesn’t expect the way that Ace moves forward, kissing him. It’s too sudden and Marco’s lip is pushed into his teeth hard enough to cut through the skin, but he still laughs when Ace pulls back.

“Thank you for the stones, I really do like them.”

Marco laughs, leaning in for a second kiss carefully, “I’m glad.”


End file.
